David Macaulay author page

David Macaulay biography

David Macaulay is an author and illustrator of children’s books and illustrated non-fiction. He was born in 1936 in Burton upon Trent and spent the first ten years of his life in Bolton before moving to the United States shortly before he turned eleven. He studied architecture at Rhode Island School of Design and later worked for an interior design firm.

Macaulay has written and illustrated books including Cathedral, Castle, The Way Things Work and Black and White. Cathedral was published by HarperCollins in paperback on 26 October 1981, and its fictional Cathedral of Chutreaux introduces readers to the making of a French Gothic cathedral. Black and White was released on 1 April 1990 by Houghton Mifflin and presents four linked stories across the page.

His work in information books includes The Way Things Work, created with Neil Ardley and published by DK in 1988. The book covers machines and principles of physics, with sections on mechanics, elements, waves, electricity and automation. In The Way We Work, Macaulay worked with co-author Richard Walker on a detailed guide to the human body for readers aged 10–14.

Macaulay has received the Caldecott Medal, Caldecott Honor Awards, the Boston Globe–Horn Book Award, the Christopher Award, an American Institute of Architects Medal and the Washington Post–Children’s Book Guild Nonfiction Award. In 2006 he received a MacArthur Fellowship.